Bitter Sixteen

by Stefan Mohamed

  I looked at the floor. ‘Um . . . well . . .’

  ‘You don’t put yourself forward,’ said Miss Stevenson. ‘That’s both a strength and a weakness. Also . . . I must admit I did maybe see you as a darker character like Tybalt. You’re familiar with the play?’

  ‘Yes. I’ve seen the Baz Luhrmann one.’

  ‘You know who Baz Luhrmann is?’

  ‘Strictly Ballroom. Romeo + Juliet. Moulin Rouge. Australia. That terrible Chanel advert.’ Stop showing off.

  She smiled and breathed a sigh of relief. ‘Thank God. All you teenagers treat us teachers with barely-disguised contempt, like you’re the bleeding edge of cool, but when a roomful of sixteen-year-olds in the twenty-first century can’t tell me who Baz Luhrmann is, it’s worrying to say the least.’

  I smiled. ‘I . . . I’m a bit of a geek, I suppose.’

  ‘Well,’ said Miss Stevenson. ‘The geeks will inherit the earth. In fact, they already kind of have. So you’re on the right track.’ She put her binder down. ‘What was I saying?’

  ‘About Tybalt . . .’

  ‘Oh yes. I’m not trying to make any statements about the aura you project, but I did think maybe you’d be better suited to a darker character. But that’s just me and besides I can’t think of many others who could do it. Not from the top years, anyway. So you’ll audition?’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘Great. You’d better get back to your group.’

  I nodded and went over to Tamsin and Dani. They were both really nice, I didn’t give them enough credit when I said that they were merely OK.

  As I sat on a bench in the playground half-watching the football and eating my Toffee Crisp, I thought about how strange it was. I’d adapted so quickly to the idea of having powers. One minute I was normal, the next I could float and move things with my mind. Who knew what else? And here I was. Just taking it in my stride. Going with the flow. Like a little Fonzie. And what’s Fonzie like?

  Oh, back to the subject of Ben King. Well, actually Benedict. He insisted on calling himself that. I suppose there’s nothing really wrong with that seeing as it was his name, but it added an extra dimension of pretentiousness that he really didn’t need because he was stuck-up enough without it. Plus it’s a name you can only really pull off if your surname is Cumberbatch. He was about my height (five feet eight inches, if you’re interested) with a spotless complexion and blonde hair that was always shiny, and he was always overly nice to everybody, especially girls, but there was always an ulterior motive. It was a sort of ‘oh look at how nice I’m being’ niceness rather than a ‘it’s nice to be nice’ niceness. He was fake. A phony. And if sitting reading The Catcher In the Rye and feeling incredibly, unjustifiably superior to everyone else had taught me anything, it was that phonies were the enemy.

  He also thought that he was a really intense actor, which he most definitely wasn’t. He’d starred in Bugsy Malone, the last school play, and he’d obviously convinced himself that he was in Goodfellas, and it had been terrible. His American accent had alternated between Bronx, Deep South and somewhere in rural Australia, for a start. But still, he was popular. They loved him. He’s a sinner, candy-coated, etceteras. He’d never liked me either, not since primary school, but he pretended to, which was another thing about him that got up my nose. He used to go out with a girl named Angelina, who everybody thought I fancied, and I sort of did, not that that made a difference, and he’d once said to me, ‘You hate me because I’m with Angelina, don’t you?’

  My surprise was genuine. ‘No! Of course not!’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Really. I don’t hate you because of Angelina.’

  ‘You don’t?’

  ‘No. I hate you because you’re a massive bell-end.’ I remember thinking that was really childish and then replying who cares?

  I do, I’d insisted. And although I was ashamed, the look on his face made it worth it.

  And now I’d nabbed the role of Romeo from under his nose. How’s that for a slice of the fried stuff?

  Was I a vindictive person? Was I the worst kind of petty? Possibly. Probably. But I couldn’t deny that it was satisfying.

  That evening I got home to find my parents sitting at the kitchen table having a Serious Discussion about Their Relationship and The Future. It was one of those talks that I found simultaneously depressing and irritating because they were so insipidly nice to each other, and the fact that the conversations usually came after a blazing row just reinforced my annoyance. One minute they’d be screaming curses at one another, the next minute they’d be drinking tea and eating chocolate Hobnobs and talking about their Feelings. I grabbed an apple from the fruit bowl and headed upstairs, followed by Daryl.

  ‘So,’ I said, lying on my bed and trying to decide which DVD to watch. ‘What did you do today?’

  ‘I read the new SFX that came in the post,’ said Daryl.

  ‘Ah, give it here?’

  ‘It’s downstairs. I’ll get it when the Aged Parents have stopped emoting.’

  ‘Cool. Anything else?’

  ‘I watched some Buffy.’

  ‘Any good?’

  ‘Always good.’

  ‘Naturally.’

  Daryl flopped down at the end of the bed. ‘What about you?’

  ‘I got offered the role of Romeo on a plate.’

  ‘I didn’t mean that! I meant . . . you know. Power-related?’

  I sat up. ‘Um . . . important news? I was basically given the lead role in the school play?’

  ‘I’m happy for you,’ said Daryl. ‘Applause, applause. But it has nothing to do with your powers.’

  ‘Sod off.’ I grabbed a DVD and put it in the player.

  ‘What is wrong with you?’ asked Daryl. ‘For God’s sake, Stanly! You were blessed with supernatural powers when you turned sixteen and now you’re watching . . . you’re watching frigging Finding Nemo! Why aren’t you out honing your skills? The least you can do is operate the DVD player psychically!’

  ‘I stopped a girl from dropping her lunch tray,’ I said. ‘And did a couple of backflips to impress some first years.’

  ‘You can do backflips now?’

  ‘I kind of . . . channel the floating into it,’ I said. ‘Nearly broke my neck the first time I tried it. Getting pretty good now, though.’

  ‘That’s awesome.’ Daryl turned his head away.

  ‘Oh don’t sulk,’ I said.

  ‘I’m not sulking,’ he sulked, sulkily.

  ‘Whatever.’ I patted him too hard and turned on the TV and the DVD player without moving my hands. ‘There!’

  ‘Great.’

  For a few moments I contained myself, but the urge to rib the stroppy beagle overcame me and I started singing, in my best Eric Cartman voice. ‘Na-na-na-na-na-na, I’ve got super powers, na-na-na-na-na-na.’

  ‘Shut up!’ he retorted, but he was already laughing and I clipped him gently round the ear and we watched the film in companionable silence.

  ‘That was good,’ said Daryl, afterwards. ‘Not powers good, but —’

  ‘Fermez la bouche, silver plate,’ I said. ‘And go and fetch me my SFX, will you? I can’t be arsed to do coursework and I want a good read.’

  ‘You got a 700-page horror masterwork for your birthday,’ said Daryl. ‘That’s probably a good read.’

  ‘Just go and fetch it, will you?’ I said. ‘There’s geek news this geek needs to be a-knowin’.’

  Daryl reluctantly got off the bed and padded over to the door. ‘What did your last slave die of?’ he muttered, as he left the room.

  ‘Insubordination,’ I said.

  ‘LOL.’

  ‘LOL it up, fuzzball.’

  He’d got me thinking, though.

  There was definitely more to be done with these powers.

  Chapter
Four

  I KNOCKED ON MR Jones The Careers Adviser’s door and waited. He was one of three Mr Joneses we had at school, so whenever anybody referred to him it was usually as Mr Jones The Careers Adviser, or sometimes Mr Jones Careers. ‘Come in,’ he said.

  The office was a tiny musty box, its walls covered with inspirational ‘you can do anything if you set your mind to it’-type posters, and Mr Jones was sitting behind a comically small desk, reading the paper. His brow scrunched. ‘Hello,’ he said. ‘Do we have an appointment?’

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘Sorry. I actually . . . I’ve only just started Year 11, I don’t think we can book appointments with you yet.’

  ‘No, I don’t think you can,’ he said. ‘So . . .’

  ‘I just wanted . . .’ I knew I remembered seeing him reading SFX at one point, and a quick scan of the room confirmed it – the new issue was poking out from under a pile of papers. ‘I’m writing a story. And I’m doing a bit of research. For the story. And I thought maybe if you had five minutes . . .’

  ‘I do, but –’

  ‘Basically, it’s about a boy my age,’ I said, ‘who finds he can fly and move things with his mind. And I was wondering what sort of jobs that might qualify him for.’

  Mr Jones The Careers Adviser still looked confused, but he was also intrigued now, I could see it. He smiled slightly. ‘All right, five minutes. Sit down.’

  I sat. ‘So,’ said Mr Jones. ‘I think my first question would be . . . why doesn’t he become a superhero?’

  ‘Bit too obvious,’ I said. ‘Plus, I’m going for a real-world kind of thing with the story. No supervillains, and he’s not always going to be in the right place at the right time when a train is about to crash or a building falls down.’

  Mr Jones laughed. ‘OK. I like that. Well. Let’s say, for the sake of argument, that revealing these powers to the public wasn’t a problem. And that he wasn’t going to be dragged away to some lab to be experimented on. What sort of thing might flight be useful for . . . deliveries, perhaps? He’d put most bike messengers, pizza delivery boys and the like out of business. Could use his telekinesis to carry a huge sack of post. Completely bypass traffic. Things like that.’

  Delivery boy or superpostman. Great. I laughed. ‘Yeah, I suppose. And he could psychically hold angry dogs out of the way while delivering letters.’

  ‘Yes. And assuming that he wasn’t limited to lifting a certain weight, telekinesis could come in useful for construction. Carrying bricks, girders and the like. Or equally, demolition. He could take a building apart one brick at a time.’

  Cool. ‘Scope for supervillainy there as well,’ I said. ‘Taking buildings apart.’

  ‘True, true, if that’s the way you wanted to go.’ Mr Jones thought for a moment. ‘If he did want to go the superhero route, however, there’s always the emergency services. Telekinesis would come in extremely handy when putting out fires, extricating people from crashed cars or rubble. Maybe even surgery.’

  ‘Chasing down criminals.’

  ‘Yes. Slightly more practical than hanging around dark alleys waiting for damsels in distress to come tottering down them. Is there any kind of upper limit on these powers?’

  I shrugged. ‘Haven’t decided yet.’

  ‘Because if there isn’t, then there’s really nowhere you couldn’t go with them,’ said Mr Jones. He seemed to be warming to the subject. ‘Say, for example, a building was on fire. Your character could remove people from inside, put out the fire, stop the building from falling down and perform surgery on anybody who was wounded. Stem bleeding, repair arteries. And then if somebody called in a crashing plane, he could quickly nip up and bring it in for a safe landing.’ He laughed. ‘Sorry. Keep coming back to superheroics.’

  ‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘That’s not a problem . . . I was just trying to think of alternatives.’

  ‘I think that stories condition us to think like this, in a way,’ said Mr Jones. ‘Any time you read about a character suddenly bestowed with supernatural powers, naturally it seems that they should turn those powers to keeping the peace, helping the less fortunate. Doing things that other people simply can’t do, rather than being better at things that other people can do already. If that makes sense.’

  ‘Hmm,’ I said. ‘Yeah. That makes sense.’

  ‘In a way, I think it’s easier for people to deal with, the idea that this super person is flying around tackling the big things, disasters and the like. It means that normal people can just get on with their lives, do their jobs. If the super person was interfering with the general status quo, that could really shake things up.’

  I nodded.

  ‘It depends on your character as well,’ said Mr Jones. ‘Would he even want to live a quiet life, using his powers for mundane, day-to-day things? There’s nothing inherently wrong with that, of course. But characters in stories tend to want to go where the action is. Wherever that may be.’

  I nodded again.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said Mr Jones, ‘I’m going to have to cut this short. I have an appointment. But thank you, it’s been very interesting – a nice change of pace from my usual meetings! I’d like to read the story when it’s finished, if that would be all right.’

  ‘Yeah,’ I said, suddenly feeling bad that I’d probably never have a story to show him. ‘Hopefully it’ll get finished. Feels like one that’s going to run and run. Thanks for your help, anyway.’

  Pizza delivery boy.

  Construction worker.

  Fireman.

  Superhero.

  Hmm.

  I snoozed through a Welsh lesson and headed to the Drama Hall when lunchtime came around. I waited for about five minutes while everyone else filed in, and eventually Miss Stevenson said, ‘OK. Everyone here? Good. Now, I want to assign the two leads first, naturally. Romeo?’

  I put my hand up half-heartedly. Not because I didn’t want the part, but because I didn’t want to look like Ben King, who was straining his arm, seemingly in an attempt to pop it clean out of its socket. We seemed to be the only two applicants. If Miss Stevenson was feeling less than favourable towards Ben, she didn’t show it. ‘OK,’ she said. ‘Ben first?’

  Ben walked out into the centre of the hall, looking smug. Miss Stevenson handed him a piece of paper. ‘You’ve seen the film?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘The modern version and an old version.’

  ‘Have you read the play?’

  ‘We’re studying it in English at the moment,’ he said. ‘We’re reading it as a class. I’m playing Romeo.’

  ‘That’s good,’ said Miss Stevenson. ‘You have a head start.’

  Ben shrugged and looked at the ground. ‘Not really.’ His false modesty act. My fingers twitched and I fought the urge to throw him out of the hall using the powers of my mind. Irrationality is such an ugly trait.

  Yeah, especially when it’s a trait you hate to see in other people.

  Oh leave me alone. Aren’t I allowed to be a hypocrite every once in a while?

  Of course. After all, it’s not like hypocrisy is also a trait you hate to see in other people, is it?

  Oh piss off.

  ‘OK, Ben,’ said Miss Stevenson, sitting at her desk. ‘Can you read this to the assembled, please? As much feeling as you can get.’

  Ben cleared his throat. ‘The measure done,’ he said, falteringly, ‘I’ll watch her place of . . . place of stand, and touching hers, make blessed my rude hand. Did my heart love till now? Forswear it, sight! For I never . . . ner . . . ne’er saw true beauty till tonight. This night.’

  I could sense laughter hiding behind the dispassionate masks of the other hopeful junior thespians. Even Miss Stevenson was having trouble. Me? I’m saying nothing for fear of sounding childish.

  ‘Thank you Ben,’ said Miss Stevenson. ‘Um . . . that was good. Now Stanly? Would you mind?’
>
  The look that Ben cast me was one of molten hate, but it was only momentary, practically subliminal, switching smoothly to a smile as he handed over the piece of paper. ‘Good luck,’ he said.

  I smiled back. ‘Cheers.’

  ‘Got the part,’ I said to Daryl that night. ‘Piece of piss.’ He was watching The Simpsons while I didn’t do my Chemistry homework. I stared at it for a long time but it might as well have been in Klingon for all the sense I could make of it.

  ‘That’s great,’ said Daryl, absently. ‘Which part?’

  ‘Romeo.’

  ‘Oh! That’s great!’ He sounded as though he meant it. ‘What about Eggs Benedict?’

  ‘He . . . didn’t do so well. It was quite funny, actually. Miss Stevenson offered him Tybalt and he basically snatched the book off her, saw that Tybalt has about seventeen paragraphs of dialogue, none of which are particularly long, and said it was a waste of time. I could see her getting really pissed off and she said that it was quality rather than quantity. She reminded him of Judi Dench in Shakespeare in Love.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Well, she’s only in it for about eight minutes and she won an Oscar. Anyway, the point of the story is that Ben said he didn’t want to be in the play anyway – it was the anyway that I really liked – and stormed out. He was in a mood all the way through afternoon lessons.’ I laughed and Daryl laughed with me.

  ‘So,’ said Daryl, after feigning interest in my day for a few more seconds. ‘Eddie.’

  ‘What about him?’

  Daryl sighed his ‘you’re not taking things seriously enough’ sigh. ‘He called you up to ask about your powers! How could he possibly have known about them? It doesn’t make sense!’

  ‘Who cares?’ I said. ‘Maybe he has The Sight. Maybe the signs are aligning. Maybe he read it in a bloody fortune cookie, what’s the difference? He knows and that’s nice. He offered me a place to stay if I need it, and that’s a relief. Why are you trying to read so much into it?’

  ‘He sounded like there was more he wanted to say,’ said Daryl, ‘you said so yourself.’